"phones" are the physical sounds of speech, like [t]. "phonemes" are theoretical ranges of a sound in a given language, like /t/. In English, the "t" in "tick" and the "t" in "stick" are different *phones* (they are pronounced differently), but English speakers perceive them both as a "t" within the range of the phoneme /t/. In Chinese, the "t" in "tick" sounds like pinyin <t> and the "t" in "stick" sounds like pinyin <d>. To Chinese speakers, they are different sounds, or phonemes. Make sense?